Oakland College (Lorman, Mississippi)

Oakland College

Oakland Memorial Chapel
Type	Four-year college
Active	1830–1871
Affiliation	Presbyterian Church in the United States of America
Endowment	US$100,000
President	Jeremiah Chamberlain Robert L. Stanton James Purviance William L. Breckenridge John Calvin
Location	Lorman, Mississippi, United States

Oakland College was a Presbyterian-affiliated four-year college reserved for whites; it operated from 1830 to 1861 near Lorman, Mississippi. After years of closure during the American Civil War of 1861–1865 and a failure to reorganize following the war, it was closed down.

The property was sold to the state. The legislature renamed the institution as Alcorn University, after the Republican governor of the state, and established it as a land grant institution and historically black college. This was the first black land grant college in the nation. After the Reconstruction era, the legislature renamed it as Alcorn Agriculture and Mechanics College, to express their emphasis that it should train students for their roles in the rural and largely agricultural state.

In the 20th century, it developed new programs and graduate studies, and was renamed as Alcorn State University, gaining university status in 1974. Some historic buildings and a cemetery of the 19th-century period remain.

The college was located in Claiborne County, Mississippi, seven miles northwest of what became known as the town of Lorman. It spanned 225 acres (91 ha) of land. It was near Rodney and Port Gibson, and was 40 miles (64 km) from Natchez. These historically significant towns had large plantations owned by members of the Southern elite.

The college was founded in 1830 by leaders of the Presbyterian Church. They hired Reverend Jeremiah Chamberlain, a Presbyterian minister educated at Dickinson College and the Princeton Theological Seminary, as the first President. Chamberlain had served as the President of Centre College and Louisiana College. More recently, he had served as the pastor of Bethel Presbyterian Church in nearby Alcorn, Mississippi.